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Thread: The CW Samurai

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    Barbarian in the Playground
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    Default The CW Samurai

    I have read over and over that the CW Samurai is possibly the worst class every made. Looking at the few things I have read online about it (I do not have CW), I can see that it isn't great but is it really worse than a Commoner or a Monk with poorly rolled stats?

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    Default Re: The CW Samurai

    Of course it's better than a Commoner and a Warrior. Everything with full BAB is.

    It's a fighter with pre-selected fighter feats. And less of them.
    You could take levels in fighter and get almost all the benefits of the samurai, but you would still have some extra feats.
    That's pretty bad.
    Last edited by Yora; 2009-08-17 at 03:43 PM.
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    Default Re: The CW Samurai

    It's above NPC classes, but I would personally believe to be below or on par with monk n soulknife. Which isn't a completely horrible thing, as there's ways to trick up anything, it's just that you'll have to expect it to be at most a one-trick pony.
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    Default Re: The CW Samurai

    There are actually a few good builds with it, if you're interested. They're either very specific, involve some pretty serious hax, or absolutely, positively require Ronin. Sometimes all three.

    Beyond that, CW samurai is probably my single least favorite base class. I'd rather play an Adept.
    Last edited by Doc Roc; 2009-08-17 at 03:41 PM.
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    Default Re: The CW Samurai

    Quote Originally Posted by Yora View Post
    Of course it's better than a Commoner and a Warrior. Everything with full BAB is.
    Well, actually, if you're going to use the "TWF" of Samurai as it's written, you can actually end worse than Warrior who just grabbed some glaive :
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    Default Re: The CW Samurai

    It's a little weaker than the Monk because you have fewer optimization options. It's basically a Fighter with horrible feat choices, a code of conduct, and one kinda cool ability. Keep in mind how easy it is to drop a Fighter to tier 6 with poor optimization.
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    Default Re: The CW Samurai

    Let's see.

    He gets the two-weapon fighting feats, Improved Initiative, and Quick Draw. And he can look at you sternly.

    That's ALL the class does.
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    Default Re: The CW Samurai

    I've always been curious if there was a samurai variant that resolves these issues. Anyone know of one?

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    Default Re: The CW Samurai

    If you can convince your GM, the samurai gets magic swords as a class feature.

    But its unlikely to happen, and its still not all that great.

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    Default Re: The CW Samurai

    Quote Originally Posted by Magugag View Post
    I've always been curious if there was a samurai variant that resolves these issues. Anyone know of one?
    At the risk of sounding flippant, Warblade and/or Swordsage.

    More to the point, what is a "samurai" anyway? In both history and fiction they're too diverse to be represented with a single class and a single type of build.

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    Default Re: The CW Samurai

    Other than the Oriental Adventures Samurai, I think there's nothing but homebrew.

    On that note however, there is some very interesting samurai homebrew out there if you can find it.

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    Default Re: The CW Samurai

    Quote Originally Posted by kamikasei View Post
    At the risk of sounding flippant, Warblade and/or Swordsage.
    No actually, now that I think, that's exactly the sort of thing I'd be looking for in a reworked samurai, especially since it even has different styles for the characters to train in.

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    Default Re: The CW Samurai

    Yep. That's... pretty much how I feel.
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    Default Re: The CW Samurai

    Yeah, Tome of Battle sort of rocks at life that way.

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    Default Re: The CW Samurai

    Warblade does samurai really, really well. Weapon Aptitude means you can use spears, bows, swords, whatever. You can also rename your maneuvers to be right out of the Book of Five Rings.

    Quicksilver Motion--->To Know Collapse

    Iron Heart Surge--->To Release Four Hands

    Exorcism of Steel--->Fire and Stone Strike

    Disarming Strike---->Red Leaves Cut

    Punishing Stance--->Strive for Height

    Diamond Nightmare Blade---->One Cut


    And so on

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    Default Re: The CW Samurai

    Quote Originally Posted by Magugag View Post
    I've always been curious if there was a samurai variant that resolves these issues. Anyone know of one?
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    Default Re: The CW Samurai

    Samurai does have some good skill choices. If you aim to get into a PrC ASAP (such as into Kensai after Sam5), then it's not too bad a class. But, as most have said already, it's much like a Fighter with no choice of feats - which will make him hard to play at late levels.

    It's a special theme-based class you just grab if you roll a ridiculously awesome set of attributes, IMHO
    Last edited by Deepblue706; 2009-08-17 at 03:56 PM.

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    Default Re: The CW Samurai

    Quote Originally Posted by Tidesinger View Post
    There are actually a few good builds with it, if you're interested. They're either very specific, involve some pretty serious hax, or absolutely, positively require Ronin. Sometimes all three.

    Beyond that, CW samurai is probably my single least favorite base class. I'd rather play an Adept.
    I'm interested. I made one of my own a few years ago, a particular trick that Samurais pull off better than anyone else, and I'm curious if anyone else had the same idea. I don't think mine's posted anywhere, but I'll write it up if there's interest.
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    Default Re: The CW Samurai

    He's a fighter that gets 5 bonus feats around his signature set of weapons; suboptimal bonus feats and weapons. Other than that, there's some intimidate abilities that use up a standard action and suck, and there's a smite ability keyed off charisma. A fighter with eleven bonus feats is better, and a paladin is better. It isn't a bad class, but Fighter replicates this class, and without the bad junk. Treat it like a fighter that has several feats pre-decided, without any synergy.

    Edit
    So much Ninja...

    A fighter with fluff would make a fine samurai. or TOB.
    Last edited by Dark Herald; 2009-08-17 at 04:14 PM.
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    Default Re: The CW Samurai

    Quote Originally Posted by Zergrusheddie View Post
    I have read over and over that the CW Samurai is possibly the worst class every made.
    No, it is awesmoe! It toalty lets you filp out an dkill ppl!!!
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    Default Re: The CW Samurai

    That amused me then, it still amuses me now.
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    Default Re: The CW Samurai

    Quote Originally Posted by Dark Herald View Post
    It isn't a bad class, but Fighter replicates this class, and without the bad junk.
    Somehow it seems to me that this sentence ends in a very different place to where it started.

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    Default Re: The CW Samurai

    If you need to get Exotic Weapon Proficiency (Bastard Sword), then a Samurai dip is superior to Fighter levels if you've already got Fighter levels. Fighter 1 and 2 gets you two consecutive levels of bonus feats, and Samurai 1 can improve that to 3 instead of waiting until Fighter 4. Of course, taking more than that is utterly pointless and detrimental to every possible build without exception. That seems like a good indicator of the power of the class.
    Last edited by FMArthur; 2009-08-17 at 05:15 PM.
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    Default Re: The CW Samurai

    Quote Originally Posted by Tidesinger View Post
    There are actually a few good builds with it, if you're interested. They're either very specific, involve some pretty serious hax, or absolutely, positively require Ronin. Sometimes all three.
    I believe there was one which took a single level of samurai, then used bloodlines to increase their effective samurai level (advancing some other class at the same time, of course) before entering ronin.
    Last edited by Prime32; 2009-08-17 at 05:34 PM.

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    Default Re: The CW Samurai

    On a tangent: on paper, the Swashbuckler looks just about as weak as the Samurai to me. Is this true?

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    Default Re: The CW Samurai

    Quote Originally Posted by Thurbane View Post
    On a tangent: on paper, the Swashbuckler looks just about as weak as the Samurai to me. Is this true?
    To a degree. Weapon Finesse is far more useful a feat than EWP: Bastard Sword and Insightful Strike is something you'd need to bend over backwards to get otherwise. 4+Int points also makes a solid skill list far more useful especially since you aren't already invested in a specific skill due to class features.

    It's still in the lower realms of power, except for one thing: Daring Outlaw [Complete Scoundrel]. This allows you to stack Rogue- and Swashbuckler-levels for Sneak Attack, suddenly making it a very respectable full BAB Two-Weapon Sneak Attacker with Int to damage and Dex to hit and decent skill points (and few random semi-relevant critical-based abilities and the ability to charge across any terrain).


    Thanks to that feat, Swashbuckler nowadays acts as the combat-version of Rogue - exactly what it should have been in the first place (I mean, what is a "Swashbuckler" but a flamboyant dirty fighter?.
    Last edited by Eldariel; 2009-08-17 at 11:27 PM.
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    Default Re: The CW Samurai

    Here is my rough research into the matter. It relies on basically some very crufty cheese with a known problem item, but you could probably actually do it with the retraining rules, depending on your GM's reading. I hope you guys like it. :)

    If you can get your GM to allow you to combo-meal Ronin this way with OA samurai, it can also be pretty neat, but whatever. Old research, kinda fruitless, never got used, etc. Hope you find it helpful.
    Last edited by Doc Roc; 2009-08-18 at 02:50 AM.
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  28. - Top - End - #28
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    Default Re: The CW Samurai

    The CW samurai is like a friggin' "invoke joke" spell around here.

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    Default Re: The CW Samurai

    Well, up to a point. Click-clack that link in my above post... It's not superb, but it's pretty cool for what it is.
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    Default Re: The CW Samurai

    What if you're Gestalting, and you combine Samurai with Rogue? You get tasty TWF as class features, saving you feats, you get better BAB and Hit Die. The intimidate based abilities stretch you too far for which stats you need, but if you ignore them you might as well go fighter so you can TWF with anything you want, like two finessable weapons instead of a Bastard Sword and whatever the wakizashi counts as.

    So for a low Dex Rogue//? build, Samurai is good. But why are you playing such a thing?

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